40fi 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



July 1 



Bee-keeping Among The 

 Rockies 



By Wesley Foster, Boulder, Colo. 



FROSTED ALFALFA. 



Ivate frosts, several of them after the mid- 

 dle of May, froze back the alfalfa so the first 

 growth is not as heavy or vigorous as it 

 should be. The setback will hardly be 

 overcome till second growth; and if the 

 grasshoppers take that we shall be in hard 

 lines for sure. Sweet clover was not hurt 

 much, and the growth this year is heavy 

 and abundant along all the ditch-banks 

 and waste-places. 



BEES WORKING ON ROSES. 



I have not seen bees gathering pollen 

 from roses, nor have I seen them tear open 

 the buds of roses; but this morning half a 

 dozen honey-bees were wedging their heads 

 away down among the petals of a rose grow- 

 ing in our yard. It is one of the large dou- 

 ble variety, somewhat variegated, in color 

 of petals ranging from a i)ink to dark red. 

 Those bees certainly were not after pollen, 

 for the way they stretched out their tongues 

 made it plain that nectar was their quest. 

 -*- 



STRENGTHENING WEAK COLONIES. 



The past winter was jjretty severe on 

 many hives that, under ordinary conditions, 

 would come through in good strong shai)e. 

 Quite a few of these have vigorous queens, 

 but are so weak in bees that there is small 

 chance for them to build ui) for work this 

 year. By changing places with a strong 

 colony the weak one gets a large force of 

 bees so they can do good work. So far we 

 have had little trouble from the bees fight- 

 ing or killing the queens. As long as the 

 plan works we shall continue, but are not 

 yet ready to give it unqualified endorse- 

 ment. 



FEEDING SYRUP IN COMBS. 



Of all the feeders described and manufac- 

 tured, nolliing works better than feeding 

 sugar syruj) in the empty combs in the hive 

 as Mr." Doolittle tells of in the June 1st 

 number of ( Jleanings. AVe use almost the 

 same method as he tells c.f, excei)t that we 

 have several dry combs under the one being 

 filled, which catch most of Ihe syru)) that 

 does not get into the cells of the comb. 

 The combs all lie in a lin-Iincd vat, so no 

 syrup is lost. In ha'f an hour we have 

 filled sevciiiy combs and placed them in 

 the hives .\o robbing being started nor the 

 bees scarcely disturbed. 



HONEY PROSPECTS FOR li»10. 



To-day, June 11, the bees are getting 

 scarcely enough honey from the alfalfa to 

 keep u]) brood-rearing, and we are doing 

 considerable feeding in several yards. 

 "White clover is in bloom, but there is never 



enough of it to affect the flow very much. 

 The weather has been too cool for satisfac- 

 tory honey-gathering, and we are anxiously 

 looking for a change to warm days and 

 nights. 



Grasshoi)i)ers are very thick this year; 

 and unless some storms destroy them, or a 

 disease sweeps them olT, we are going to 

 have little alfalfa bloom, after the first cut- 

 ting, for the bees to work on. The grass- 

 hoppers now are about the size of a pea or 

 bean; but they grow fast, and eat more as 

 they grow in size. We will not give up hope 

 till there are no grounds for hope left. 



LAYING WORKERS. 



Mr. Allen Latham is certainly right about 

 the laying worker being a "a rare bird" in 

 the ai)iary, though bee-keejiers, no doubt, 

 give them credit for the trouble when an 

 undersized queen is the cause. But I have 

 been more fortunate, if the presence of lay- 

 ing workers in a hive is fortunate, for I 

 have seen as many as half a dozen laying 

 workers at the operation of depositing eggs 

 in cells on one side of a single comb. The 

 operation seemed much more difficult than 

 for any full-sized queen I ever saw laying 

 an egg; for the laying worker, being so 

 much shorter, could hardly back into the 

 cells far enough to deposit her eggs at the 

 base. The way their wings would si)read 

 out when trying to reach the bottom of the 

 cell was amusing. After watching this 

 number of laying workers as long as I did. 

 there is no doubt in my mind that they were 

 all genuine laying workers. It is the only 

 case I have ever seen where the culprits 

 were at work, though there have been cases 

 when laying workers were supposed to be the 

 cause when a jioor (|ueen may have been at 

 fault. I am glad Mr. Latham l)rought up 

 this question, for now I shall be more care- 

 ful in finding the real cause. 



THE BEE-KEEPER. 



The editor speaks in the June 1st issue of 

 his need of material dealing with the fun- 

 damentals of our business. The man, the 

 location, the hive, the (pieen, and the mar- 

 ket are the main fundamentals; but little 

 has been said in the journals about the 

 ((ualiiies neces^^ary for a surressful bee- 

 keei)er. The man is the most fundamental 

 of all the.-5e mentionetl. Energy, system, 

 an 1 willingness to adopt new ideas are 

 characteristics I have noticed in the most 

 successful bee-men. The progressive bee- 

 keeper now knows what his market de- 

 mands, and will i)ay him the best profit, 

 and he has a system of work that accom- 

 plishes the most for the least elTort. Every 

 really progressive man I know in the busi- 

 ness reads one or several journals, and up 

 to certain limits is experimenting with some 

 new appliance or idea that has as its aim 

 the saving of time and effort. Some are 

 succeeding with intensive methods while 

 the larger majority do better with extensive 

 methods. 



